North Port at odds with business leaders

The City Commission this week disbanded a panel of prominent business and civic leaders that has advised city leaders about economic development.

By DALE WHITE

The rift between a majority of this city's commissioners and organizations that represent its business sector is getting wider.

The latest disagreement is over a decision by the City Commission this week to disband a panel of prominent business and civic leaders that has advised city leaders about economic development.

Mayor Linda Yates, joined by commissioners Rhonda DiFranco and Cheryl Cook, voted to dissolve the Business and Economic Development Advisory Board. In coming months, the commission will consider forming a new board with a different makeup and expectations.

The vote angered business leaders — and other members of the City Commission.

“It's a dark day for North Port,” said Commissioner Tom Jones, who joined Commissioner Jim Blucher in opposition.

Supporters of the economic board say the city benefits by having representatives of education, health care, real estate and other sectors of the economy brainstorm ideas for how the city can lure businesses and help them grow.

“I fail to see why an advisory board is so threatening to this commission,” Beth Mayberry of the North Port Advocacy Alliance told the commissioners recently, calling the decision “a waste of goodwill and experience.”

Fred Tower, a Chamber member and former city commissioner who served on the advisory panel, also criticized the dissolution of a board that he insists has given the city “direct access to regional leaders” and “put North Port economically on the map.”

Progress and setbacks

Mayor Yates said North Port has spent $2.5 million during the past five years to implement recommendations made by the Business and Economic Development Advisory Board — including an aggressive advertising campaign, various studies and the creation of an economic development office at City Hall.

“What does the city have to show for that?” Yates said. “There's no way to pinpoint a direct result.”

Whether the advisory board deserves credit or not, North Port, which was hit hard by the recession, is back in growth mode.

During the previous fiscal year, the city issued 1,008 business licenses, compared with 888 the year before, and saw a 9 percent increase in commercial construction permits.

Since 2008, 10 sizable companies have put down roots in North Port and created nearly 500 new jobs in product manufacturing and distribution.

The opening of Sarasota Memorial Hospital's emergency room in 2009 eventually contributed to more than 100 health care professionals opening offices in the city. A new assisted-living facility with an expected $3 million payroll got approved this week.

Yet the city has experienced setbacks as well.

In 2011, the city struck an agreement with Big League Dreams, which promised to build a $20 million baseball park with replicas of Major League fields to attract adult and youth tournaments. The project, toward which the city gave $450,000 in taxpayer money, still has not happened and the city is owed its money back.

Strained relationships

The decision to disband the advisory board puts more strain on the city's relationship with entities such as the North Port Area Chamber of Commerce and the Economic Development Corp. of North Port.

Those organizations were already at odds with Yates, DiFranco and Cook over a series of decisions that led to the recent closing of Warm Mineral Springs, an iconic tourist attraction, and the loss of more than 40 jobs there.

In March, although the EDC invited them, the same three commissioners were noticeably absent at a luncheon at which the EDC announced its ideas for recruiting $250 million in new construction and 1,700 new jobs.

So, as expected, the commission's dismantling of the economic development panel received an ice-cold reception from business leaders who already felt snubbed.

“It's the same 3-2 vote” as decisions affecting Warm Mineral Springs, said Robert Rosenberg, chairman of the EDC of North Port, a nonprofit organization that receives no subsidy from the city and had no representative on the advisory board. “It's so frustrating. . .

“They went totally the wrong way on Warm Mineral Springs,” Rosenberg said. The dissolution of the economic development group, he said, is yet another “mistake” that makes the city appear to be anti-business.

Rosenberg worries that potential employers who otherwise might be interested in North Port will instead go to other cities, where they may consider the political climate to be more hospitable.

Positive or negative?

Yates told other commissioners she expected the media to put “a negative spin” on the decision.

But Blucher — who voted against dismantling the committee and, with City Manager Jonathan Lewis, represented the city on it — told Yates a negative perception cannot be avoided. “You can't put a spin on it to be positive.”

Yates believes the decision to repeal a 2007 ordinance creating the board and then talk later this month about writing a new ordinance for a new advisory panel on economic matters is widely misunderstood.

The repealed ordinance called for the 26-member panel to include representatives from the city, Sarasota County Commission, Chamber of Commerce, Economic Development Corp. of Sarasota County (a separate entity from the newer North Port EDC), Gulf Coast Community Foundation, School Board, State College of Florida and University of South Florida.

Sarasota Memorial Hospital represented the medical community. The North Port Sun filled a seat reserved for a local newspaper. Florida Power & Light represented the utility industry. Other members filled seats reserved for a banker, developer, the real estate industry and other interests.

Yet Yates contends that the panel's diversity hindered it.

Sunshine Law debate

The advisory board only met quarterly and its members, like the city commissioners, were to abide by public meetings laws and not confer privately about potential city business, Yates said.

“That prohibits these folks from having conversations that, in my opinion, they should be having every day,” Yates said. “We don't want to prevent them from getting together and networking.”

Yates said the board had been comprised of “key stakeholders” and “think tanks” who should be collaborating in the private sector rather than as a public body.

“I think we can restructure this advisory board in a way that represents the taxpayers,” Yates said.

She suggests that the new advisory board be comprised of people from the 1,000 or so businesses in North Port who can share “a citizen's perspective.”

DiFranco considers 26 members to be too unwieldy and said the new board should have “possibly 12 to 16.”

Noting that other cities, such as Venice, have economic development advisory boards, Rosenberg disagrees with Yates' argument that they are handicapped by public meetings laws.

“The Sunshine Law is not a deterrent to getting things done,” Rosenberg said. “They were an advisory board. They weren't making policy decisions. They weren't making binding decisions for the city. Their recommendations could be accepted or not accepted by the city.”

Tower argued that the “same pretense” about the Sunshine Law would apply to all of the city's advisory boards, “not just the BEDAB.”

Separating the interests of the public and private sectors was key in the three commissioners' thinking about Warm Mineral Springs, which the city and Sarasota County bought in December 2010.

As a new majority on the City Commission, Yates, DiFranco and Cook derailed a plan for the city and county to find a private developer to manage Florida's only warm spring and enhance it as a resort. They objected to letting a private business profit from a public asset they would rather see preserved as a park.

Yet the business sector thinks the city squandered an opportunity to make the springs a major catalyst for additional jobs and tourism.

The Chamber of Commerce launched a public relations campaign among its members, “SOS” (“Save Our Springs"), in an unsuccessful effort to keep the springs open.

The springs closed June 1, when the concessionaire's contract expired. The County Commission and City Commission had been unable to agree on how to award a new concessionaire contract.

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